


Time is a Matter of Perspective

by TheLordismyGod



Category: Mr. Peabody & Sherman (2014)
Genre: Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-22
Updated: 2019-02-17
Packaged: 2019-02-18 14:55:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13102551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLordismyGod/pseuds/TheLordismyGod
Summary: Mr. Peabody & Sherman are just out on another time travel adventure one day, when a slight error by Peabody proves to be more trouble than it first seems.





	1. Dad Goofs

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everybody. No, I’m not dead, life happens, I’m sure you understand. Yes, I STILL want to finish Transporter, and yes, I realize the MPaS fandom is pretty much dead, so this is more for me than anything. 
> 
> So this one was very heavily inspired by the Quantum Break and Life is Strange videogames, and Doctor Strange's time powers. I don’t actually have a plot per se, so I may just leave this one hanging, the idea literally hit me one day and I was so excited to write and get it out there because it’s never been done before to my knowledge. It's also gonna be my first real story where Sherman's older than 7, and first POV story, as you might have guessed from the title ; ).

**Sherman's POV**

_Thunk!_

“Ahh!” I yelled as the one of the tribe members’ arrow pierced the bark of the tree inches from my head as I ran past it.

“Mr. Peabody! What did you do to make them so mad!?” I yelled to my father, who was running right next to me.

“I don’t know Sherman! It may be a possibility that I mistook the ancient Aztec word for ‘bathroom’ and said, ‘Thank you for allowing me into your ‘bathroom’, rather than ‘home’…”

“Well they don’t seem that forgiving of a little mispeak!” I looked behind us as the angry mob kept chasing us, spears in hand, shaking their fists and yelling in their native tongue.

“Well he **is** the king of the tribe Sherman, a very important person, and so it’s important not to offend him…” He dropped to all fours as he dodged another arrow and continued to run.

“Well clearly you did!” Luckily, being a 14-year-old, and being practically forced by my father to take track and field in school, I could keep up with him. As for him, well he was just lucky he had a human’s lifespan as well as intelligence, and was still in his prime.

We continued running through the forest that we hid the WABAC in, just on the outskirts of the tribe’s field that they lived in, what branches I couldn’t avoid slapping and scratching my face.

I looked behind us again and was dismayed to see the tribe still chasing us, gaining slightly due to their edge of hunting animals for food in the forest for so long. “Where’s the WABAC??”

“Over here!” He turned slightly, and continued running. “Hurry up Sherman, it is imperative we reach it and get inside before they catch us!”

“You think I don’t know that!?” I sped up to match his speed and pulled the WABAC controller out of my pocket and pushed a button on it.

Just to my left I saw our WABAC time machine rematerialize as it decloaked and the stairs extended, ready for us to run inside. Dad got there first and jumped inside, me quickly following. He immediately shut the door and fired up the WABAC’s engines to lift off.

As we lifted off we started hearing the pounding of metal against metal as the tribe that was so angry with my father reached the WABAC and started attacking it with their spears.

“Dad…” I said hesitantly.

“Don’t worry Sherman, we should be fine-”

He spoke too soon, just as he said that we both heard an awful screech of metal against metal and the WABAC’s emergency system suddenly flashed us both in a red hue.

‘Warning! Reflective panel lost!’

“That’s not good.” He said.

We continued to liftoff regardless and both let out a shaky breath as a final arrow pinged off the WABAC and we were high in the sky. Dad entered the time and space coordinates for home and the WABAC entered the blue wormhole and we were home free.

I sighed as I leaned back in my seat and relaxed, breathing heavily.

“You need to study your ancient Aztec more.” I said to my father.

He just nodded as he concentrated on flying. “It appears so…”

He finally set the WABAC to auto drive and leaned back in his seat as well. After a few moments, we both looked at each other and just started laughing. We couldn’t help it. It was a mental negative feedback loop, helping restore emotional stability.

We both finally calmed down and sat in a silence for a few minutes. I was staring at one of the displays showing what looked like various lines on a graph when a thought occurred to me.

“Dad?”

“Yes, Sherman?”

“What would happen if timelines were to collide?”

He turned and looked at me. “What do you mean?”

“If like, say time were to move faster, like when those tribesmen were chasing us. If time moved faster for us only, would we be able to outrun them? Even though we might have been running the same speed they were?”

He chuckled. “Well, now you’re getting into general relativity Sherman, you’re talking about time dilation.”

“Time dilation?”

“Yes, it’s the difference of elapsed time between two events as measured by observers either moving relative to each other or differently situated from a gravitational mass or masses.”

I blinked.

“Let me see if I can explain better: the closer you are to the center of gravity, the slower time will move, from the perspective of an observer farther away from the center of it. But the possibility of that happening with us and that tribe was absolutely zero. We were both in the same place, at the same distance from the center of the earth, and moving approximately the same speed for any kind of time dilation to happen.”

I smirked. “You’re such a nerd.”

He rolled his eyes. “I prefer genius.”

Suddenly, the WABAC started jerking randomly back and forth.

I groaned. "What's going on now??"

I hit some buttons on the control panel in front of me and brought up the WABAC's status monitor. As soon as I did, I could tell in my peripheral vision that Dad had noticed what came up on my monitor and gone pale even under all that white fur.

"No...no nono, that’s not good at all..." I said as I frantically pushed a couple more buttons.

"Oh no... The Time Core is damaged." Dad said as he gripped the sides of his seat with one paw in an attempt to steady himself from the jerking motion of the WABAC while still looking at the large white blob that had been brought up on my screen, but was now blinking red.

"What does that do again?"

"The Time Core is what controls the creation of, and us entering and exiting, the wormholes. If we don’t get home soon, and the Time Core breaks down with us in the middle of this wormhole, who knows when or where we'll end up... "

"So basically, if the Time Core fails, we will have a WA(Y), rather than a WA(BACK) in time." I joked, trying to lighten the mood.

He smiled slightly. "Yes, we will have a flying red ball with no time travel abilities."

We finally emerged from the wormhole right above the platform in the WABAC room. Dad gently set us down as best he could amidst the jerking and shut off the WABAC. It finally stopped jerking and moving and remained still.

"Well, at least we're home." I sighed again and smiled.

Dad sighed in happiness too and quickly got up from his seat and opened the door.

"Let's check the damage, shall we?"

I followed him out the door and it wasn’t long before we found the missing reflective plate, near the bottom left of the WABAC. We both got on our hands and knees to examine the casualty.

Sure enough, one of the reflective panels that helped the WABAC cloak itself had been ripped away, showing its innards, wires and the metal structural support beams for the whole machine.

Dad poked around the area for a bit and I just watched when I noticed something glowing blue just past two metal support beams that were right close to each other.

"What's that?" I asked, pointing at it.

"That is the Time Core, and actually....it looks like I found the culprit of our problems..." He reached his paw in towards it and jerked it and withdrew an arrow.

"Well that explains everything, the panel was ripped off, and one of the tribes arrows just happened to shoot right in and hit the Time Core..."

I frowned. "Can you fix it?"

"Yes, but it will take-"

Suddenly the Time Core started pulsating and making a very loud, low thrumming sound.

Dad grabbed me and quickly pulled me away.

"Get away from it Sherman!"

"What's gonna happen?! Is it gonna explode!"

"I don’t know! It’s never done this before!"

And all him and I could do was stand and watch in fear as the thrumming got louder and louder, and the glow got brighter and brighter from the hole the reflective panel had made. Suddenly, it stopped and made a loud bang and a large bubble or sphere of blue light came shooting out of the WABAC from all directions, engulfing everything. We both turned to run across the platform, but it was too fast; it reached us, throwing us both forward and fading away at the big red door at the end of the platform.

But the force was so powerful it had knocked both of us to floor and I blacked out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully you’re intrigued. I do have ideas for a couple more chapters, but other than that, I got nothing.


	2. Chronokinesis

**Peabody's POV**

I groaned as I awoke, a splitting headache throbbing in my head as I sat up holding it in one paw. I gasped as I quickly looked over at Sherman and noticed he was still out, but sighed in relief as I checked his pulse.

“Still alive…”

I gently shook him in an effort to wake him.

“Sherman… Sherman…wake up.”

Sherman stirred and groggily opened his eyes.

“Ugghh, Mr. Peabody, what happened?

“I… am not sure…” I said as I stood up and looked at the WABAC.

It was fine, and the seemingly harmless energy field that had engulfed us was gone. I looked down at my paws as I held them up and examined them. I felt fine, aside from the headache that was now abating. Hopefully there wouldn’t be any lasting effects from that energy field…

Sherman held his head and groaned again. "I have a horrible headache."

“I do as well, but it should pass in a minute or two.” I said.

We both walked over to the WABAC to examine it more closely. I leaned down to look into the hole where the Time Core was and noticed it had gone out and was just a dark metal and glass case now, like a blown out fuse.

"Unfortunately, it looks like we won’t be taking any time travel trips for a very long time Sherman." I said as I disconnected it and pulled it out.

“Why not?” Sherman said as he came out of the WABAC and joined me.

“The Time Core is completely broken and the mathematics involved took me weeks if not months to calculate, not to mention it requires some extremely rare materials.”

“Well, all of the WABAC’s other systems are functional, I checked them. It’ll fly, just not time travel…” He groaned. “and I have another history paper coming up I need to write.”

“Well you’ll just have to research it the old fashioned way.” I said as I started walking back across the platform and into my lab.

Sherman sighed as he followed. “Might as well get started then.” He glanced up at the clock over my lab door and looked back at me.

“Is dinner going to be on time tonight?” He asked, glancing at the Time Core that I had placed on my lab table.

“Oh yes, in fact along with that I first have a business matter I need to attend to downstairs with the company, so I will take care of that and then be back up to start on dinner.” I said as I followed him back over to the elevator.

“Ok, well… let me know if I can help speed it up at all…” Sherman said as he pushed the up button.

I smiled. “Of course.”

The elevator opened and we both walked into it.

“What do you need to do downstairs?” Sherman asked as he leaned against the back wall of the elevator.

“Unfortunately, I need to let one of my employees go.”

“Why can’t HR handle that?” Sherman asked.

“This one is a unique situation, and I’d like to handle it personally.” I explained.

“Ah.” Sherman nodded.

The elevator doors opened and we headed our separate ways, Sherman for his room and me for my office.

I didn’t want to do this, but I had to. I first had to call Cynthia, my secretary and head of HR to make sure she was ready for our meeting; so, I grabbed the phone and dialed her extension.

“Hello Mr. Peabody… are you ready?” her voice came over the phone, it sounded downtrodden and weary, like she didn’t want to do this. I didn’t blame her.

“Yes, I’ll be down in a few minutes. Is Alan there yet?”

“Yes, he’s already in the conference room.”

We hung up and I walked back over to the elevator and took it down to the floor right below the WABAC’s.

I got out and walked over to Cynthia’s desk. She saw me and got up, a folder in her hand. She joined me and we both started walking toward the small conference room where we were to have the meeting with Alan.

“Is that everything?” I asked her.

“Yes, severance agreement and all.”

We reached the room and through one of the windows I could see Alan sitting in one of the chairs facing the outside window.

I sighed. “Are you ready?” I asked, looking up at Cynthia.

“Yes” she said as she steeled her face and put on a neutral expression.

I nodded and opened the door and she followed me inside.

“Hello Mr. Barkley, thank you for coming today, especially on such short notice.” I said as I walked in, hitching a smile on my muzzle.

Alan turned around and noticed both of us. “Oh, I normally work today, so it wasn’t a problem.” He said as he stood up and took my outstretched paw and shook it.

Cynthia and I took two of the chairs opposite him and we all sat down again.

“So, what’s this about?” he asked, smiling.

His smile made it much harder for me to get to the point.

“Well Mr. Barkley, I don’t want to beat around the bush at all, but, as you know, since our major restructuring of the support aspect of Peabody Industries, and the merging of the various support helpdesks, much of your team is now in New Jersey. And much of your team that was also here with you have now left for other endeavors, so you are the only one left. And, thus…. your position is being eliminated and today is your last day at Peabody Industries. I’m sorry, but it is in the company’s best interests.”

While I was giving him the news his smile had slowly faded. It hit me like a punch to the gut, delivering this news.

“But I’m sure you’ll find our severance package to be very competitive, and should suffice you well enough until you find other employment.” Cynthia added quickly, trying to soften the blow.

Alan still said nothing.

“Well…It’s not like I wasn’t expecting this…I mean, after everyone started leaving, I suspected it would happen.”  he finally said.

I nodded. “And I’m sure you can understand, you physically being here, but your immediate supervisor being in New Jersey, along with the majority of your team, just makes it hard on the company, the resources to conduct meetings, coordinating events, etc.” I said as I watched his face, trying to decipher what emotions he was feeling.

“Yeah…” he said.

“So, this is Cynthia, “ I said, gesturing to her. “she will talk you through the severance agreement and-”

“But why can’t I just take a different position here in the building?” he suddenly asked.

“Well… unfortunately, there are none available. Which is of course a testament to the quality of this workplace.” I answered.

Even though I am CEO of the company that bears my name, I still like knowing the intricate workings and details of it that a CEO normally doesn’t so of course I knew this to be true, and was disappointed I could not provide a better answer for him.

Alan suddenly looked at me square in the face and I could see a hint of annoyance. “Of course, there’s that slight arrogance the great Mr. Peabody is known for. I was wondering when it would pop up.”

I was slightly taken aback. “I beg your pardon?”

He laughed. “It’s also funny, you think your company’s so great, when there’s lots of other organizations that have just as good employee retention rates, but here I am being let go.”

“I sincerely apologize Mr. Barkley, I did not mean for it to sound that way.” I said quickly.

“Well, it sounded like it to me,” he said, getting up. “After all I’ve done for you and the company…how long I’ve been here…” he started mumbling.

Cynthia got up quickly. “Mr. Barkley, why don’t we go discuss your severance agreement, please follow me.”

And so, she led the way out the door, and Alan followed her, but before he left, he held the door open.

“I never really liked you much anyway.” He said, and then slammed the door closed.

Luckily the door was made of wood, and didn’t have any glass to shatter, but force of the slam traveled to the vase sitting on the attached table right next to it, causing it to wobble and begin to tip.

I watched in slow motion as the center of gravity shifted past the point of no return and the vase began to fall. I gasped and in instinct reached out with a paw to try and stop it, but of course I was across the room.

But the next moment I wondered if my senses had failed me.

The vase was frozen in midair.

I breathed out in surprise and withdrew my paw.

The vase continued its descent, and as it should, hit the floor and broke, the sound of glass breaking reverberating slightly through the room. But I stared at it in bewilderment. What had just happened?

I slowly walked around the table and over to where the vase lay shattered in pieces on the floor, approaching it like it was a wounded animal that might lash out at any second.

_“What just happened?”_ I thought again. This is beyond all the laws of physics I know. And I know a lot.

Now curious, I stretched out my paw toward the vase again, and immediately it reconstructed itself and, I can’t think of a more appropriate word, _flew_ back up to its previous place on the table.

I opened my muzzle as the realization dawned on me. The WABAC energy field must have affected me.

“I have…. time powers… of some kind.” I said to myself as I looked at my paw incredulously.

_“I have to tell Sherman and see if he’s been similarly affected.”_ I quickly left the room and dashed over to the elevator, entering the pin code for access to our penthouse floor.

As soon as the elevator opened its doors I quickly walked over to Sherman’s room and knocked.

“Come in.” Came Sherman’s muffled reply.

I opened the door and saw Sherman sitting at his desk under his bunk bed.

He turned and noticed me.

“Oh Mr. Peabody perfect, I need your help.”

“Can it wait? I need to talk to you.” I said.

“Sure, anything to avoid school.” He said, spinning completely around in his chair.

“Are you feeling ok?” I asked him.

“Yeah, why wouldn’t I?” he asked, shrugging his shoulders.

“Well because… I believe I may have been affected by that energy field from the WABAC.”

Sherman suddenly looked worried. “Why? Did something happen to you?”

“The employee I let go, he slammed the door to the conference room we were in hard enough to knock a vase over and it fell, but I stopped it.”

“How?” he asked, puzzled.

“I… stretched out my paw.”

“Annnnd… it just stopped?” He looked at me disbelievingly.

“Yes, it sounds crazy but that is indeed what happened.”

Sherman suddenly took his hand and knocked his pencil case to the floor, causing all the pencils to fly out.

“Do it again then.” He said.

“But I don’t know how I did it the first time.” I said.

“Well stretch out your paw to start like you did before.” He said.

I did as he asked and this time the pencils flew partway back into the pencil holder but then flew back out to their previous positions.

Sherman stared at them in shock.

“How did you do that??”

“Like I said, I don’t know.”

“Well… try concentrating.”

I sighed and reached toward them again but this time concentrated on trying to move the pencils back into their holder and onto Sherman’s desk.

They did as I wished, albeit slowly, while jerking forward in time again, the sound of the holder hitting the floor and the pencils scattering playing backwards and distorted in our ears, until they finally came to rest in the holder on the desk.

Sherman stared at them for a few moments before breaking into a smile and jumping up and gripping me in a hug excitedly.

“You have time powers!” he yelled and then let me go.

“Yes, it appears I do.” I said slowly.

“But what about me…?, I was hit by that energy field too…” Sherman began to make silly gestures at his pencil holder, moving his fingers about and waving his hands around.

The pencil holder did not move.

I couldn’t help but laugh at how silly he looked, but then became serious again.

“Maybe your abilities haven’t manifested themselves yet.”

He pouted. “Maybe.”

“But Sherman, you cannot tell anyone of this. And if you do get any powers, do **not** use them, at least if I’m not around.” I said.

“Why not?? How can I **not** tell anyone? Can I just tell Penny? I’ll just tell her.”

“Not even Miss Peterson, you know how she likes to gossip.” I said quickly. “I don’t want the whole of New York knowing because this would just cast more attention on us and we already have enough as it is. And with this being new for both of us, who knows the extent of the accidental damage we could cause. We don’t want another timeline catastrophe.”

He sighed and slumped back down in his chair. “Fine.”

The rest of the night was spent in pleasant activity together, I made dinner, helped Sherman with his homework for a short time, and tested my power out more; at the behest of Sherman of course. He would throw various items around the room and I would return them to their previous place. He attempted to as well, but was unsuccessful.

We finally began to turn in but Sherman had barely worked on his homework assignment, due to his excitement about my abilities and possibly his own.

I walked over to my bedroom door, but before going into it, I turned to Sherman.

“I do not want you staying up all night working on your homework, it is a school night after all….” Sherman looked at me with a mischievous grin. “..or attempting to use any powers you may have.” I added quickly.

He sighed. “Ok, fine.”

He kissed me on the top of my head. “Goodnight dad. Love you.”

I smiled. “I love you too.”

He walked over to his bedroom door and shut it after himself as I did the same.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: I used a variation of my real name and a relatively recent real life experience that happened to me as inspiration for the way Peabody finds out about his time powers. Only I certainly didn’t react the same way Alan did physically, but some of his dialogue was pretty much my thought processes after I lost my own job much the same way. I also thought it would be funny to have someone who isn’t a villain not like Peabody because as we all know, Peabody tends to have the opposite effect on most people, regardless of the flaws of his personality. XD Also, DRAMA! Not done it much before, so I got some practice.


	3. Bullet Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "(also known as frozen moment, the big freeze, dead time, flow motion or time slice) The detachment of the time and space of a viewer from that of its visible subject."

**Sherman’s POV**

“Sherman wake up!”

I jerked awake in surprise as my father shook me. “Agh! Dad! Don’t do that!”

He walked over to my curtains and threw them open, letting the morning sunlight fill my room.

“You slept in past your alarm!” He scolded, turning around.

I groaned and squinted, unable to see him clearly against the bright morning light streaming in through the window.

“Did you stay up last night?” He asked.

“Yes, but not trying to use any powers, I just barely finished my report, it’s due today.” I said as I got up, reluctantly disentangling myself from my warm cocoon of blankets and stretching.

“Sherman! I don’t want to raise a procrastinator! How late did you stay up?”

“Uhhhh, maybe 2?” I said as I put on my glasses.

He glanced at my clock. “You only got 5 hours of sleep??”

“I guess so.” I said, yawning.

He groaned and sighed in exasperation as he rubbed the bridge of his snout. “I’m all for your commitment to academia Sherman, but when it comes before your well being I won’t allow it.”

He walked over to my door. “Get dressed and come eat breakfast, we don’t have much time.” He said before he left.

I sighed. “Yes, dad.”

I quickly got dressed and grabbed my book bag and joined him at the dining room table. After a very tasty (as usual) breakfast he shooed me to the elevator.

“According to my calculations, the bus should arrive in 10 minutes, barring any vehicular accidents or weather phenomena. As usual, have a good day at school, **don’t** tell anyone about last nights developments, and…” His expression softened. “I love you Sherman.”

“I have a deep regard for you as well Mr. Peabody.” I grinned.

He smiled too. I had kept up the tradition of saying that instead when leaving for school for the past 7 years.

The elevator doors closed and I was on my way to the first floor.

I stepped out of the elevator, waved goodbye to Ashley, the receptionist, and put on my headphones. I jammed out while I waited for the bus, but unfortunately I was so tired that I dozed off at the stop and almost missed it. Luckily the driver honked at me and I quickly stepped onto it and was on my way.

Driving a regular car was awkward for Dad, and he still didn’t like to drive in his specially fitted car when he could avoid it. So as soon as I was too big to ride the moped and old enough to ride the public bus, he told me that’s how I would be getting to school from now on.

I didn’t mind it, I liked listening to music and having a brief alone time to and from school.

All too soon, Susan B. Anthony came into view and I got off the bus.

“Hi Sherman!” Penny called to me from the doors.

“Hi Penny!” I greeted her as I walked up the steps. “Guess what??”

The words had barely left my mouth before I remembered my fathers warning to not divulge the events of last night.

“What?” She asked eagerly.

“Uhhhmm, nothing.”

She frowned. “Then why’d you say guess what?”

“Uh because I was just joking.” I said sheepishly.

She looked at me suspiciously. “No… I think there is something, what is it? Besides the fact that you look really tired.”

“Seriously Penny, it’s nothing. And I’m tired because I was up most of the night finishing my report on Theodore Roosevelt.”

She continued to look at me with half closed eyes and pursed lips for a few seconds before shrugging as we both walked into the school. “So, are we going on any ‘trips’ soon?”

I figured I could tell her that the WABAC was broken. “Uh, no… the WABAC is broken, and will be for a while, according to Mr. Peabody.” I said as I walked around a couple students opening their lockers.

“What??” she said. “What happened??”

I quickly told her what happened, including the WABAC malfunctioning when we got back home, leaving out the later developments.

Her eyes widened as I told her. “Are you and Mr. Peabody ok??” she asked as I finished.

“Yes, we’re fine” I said.

She looked at me suspiciously again as she dodged another student going the other way. “Is that what you were going to tell me?”

“Yes.” I said quickly.

We finally reached our lockers and dropped our jackets and book bags into them, grabbing only the books and folders we needed for the day.

“Well that sucks.” She said as we both walked toward our first class, history.

“Yeah…” I pulled out my report and placed it on my desk as I sat down and Penny did the same behind me.

Mrs. Patricia, our teacher, walked in and strode to the front of the room. Most of the rowdy, talkative students quieted down once she walked in, quickly running to their seats and sitting down.

“Good morning class.” She said, placing her bag on the desk.

There were a few scattered “Good morning Mrs. Patricia”’s from the class, but that was it. She didn’t notice it, because she simply plowed on. She was like that. Didn’t care much.

“Now, as you all hopefully know, your report on Theodore Roosevelt is due today, and I see that some of you already have them out, good job Mr. Peabody and Miss Peterson.”

She then called on one of the front students to gather all the reports that had been brought up to her desk and then class began.

“Now, please open your history books to page 307, we are going to learn about Leonardo da Vinci today.”

I internally sighed. This was going to be a boring class. I already knew more about Leonardo da Vinci than any history textbook.

As she droned, I tried to pay attention, but my eyelids were quickly drooping…

“Leonardo da Vinci was an Italian painter who lived during the Italian Renaissance, from 1452 to 1519…”

_“Yes, I know this…. So tired… I’ll just close my eyes and try to listen…”_

“But… he was so much more than that…”

_“Oh he certainly was… he was… -is my godfather too… man, tenses are so annoying when you time travel… Maybe I’ll just lean forward and put my head on my arms… Oh yes… that’s good…..no prods or scoldings from the teacher? Nice!”_

_“I just wish this class would hurry up…I’ll ace the report the teacher will likely assign on him, heck, once dad gets the WABAC fixed I can just go ask him anything I need to know…”_

Suddenly I noticed the teachers droning voice had been replaced with a buzzing noise, I almost lifted my head and opened my eyes, but I was so tired, I didn’t bother.

I concentrated on the sound and it sounded like someone was speaking extremely fast, like they had been sped up in audio editing software…was it the teacher…?

“Sherman!” Penny shook me.

“What??” I quickly lifted my head and looked around.

The classroom was almost empty, only a couple students were filing out and the teacher was sitting at her desk working on grading the reports.

“You must be really tired,” she said worriedly “you slept through the whole class…”

“What…?”

“You were facedown on your arms through the whole class…”

_“But I wasn’t… I don’t think I slept… did I? I **was** really tired…”_

“Oh. Yeah, I guess.” I said.

“Come on, we gotta get to our next class.”

The next class passed without issue, it was a lot more interactive, which probably contributed to my not falling asleep or making whatever the heck happened in history happen again.

After that class it was finally lunchtime.

Penny and I grabbed our lunches and sat down by ourselves at a table.

“So, what did I miss in history?” I asked, taking a bite of my sandwich.

“Nothing really, most of what the teacher talked about I already knew.” Penny said with a smirk. “She did assign a report on him, as per her usual. I stuck your copy of the directions in your book bag.”

“Thanks.”

She nodded as she took a swig from her water bottle.

Suddenly we both heard a voice. “Hey! Freak!”

Penny looked at someone somewhere behind me and frowned and I turned around in my seat to see who had called me that.

A big kid who looked about 17 or 18 was walking up to where Penny and I sat, an angry expression on his face. He wore big nerdy glasses but also had some kind of sports sweatshirt on, which was unusual because not a lot of the kids in the school were ever nerdy and into sports at the same time.

I tried to just take it. “Yes, I am fully aware I am a freak. Who are you?” I said, standing up.

“Sherman!” Penny scolded.

He finally stormed up to me. “I’m Dylan Barkley, and because of your ‘dog’ father, my real one is now out of a job!”

_“Oh, he must be the employee that dad let go of last night…”_

“Well, I’m sorry…but I can’t make him hire your dad back…” I said slowly.

“We may lose our house now!”

“Oh man… look I’m really sorry, but there is nothing I can do…”

“Also…I don’t get something, maybe you can help me understand…” Penny said, walking around the table and coming to my defense. “Sherman had absolutely nothing to do with it, but you’re going after him like it’s at least partially his fault. **But** , you said ‘my real one’, referring to your dad, in contrast to Sherman’s apparently fake dad, according to you. So… if Sherman’s dad is fake, and not his dad in any sense, why are you even angry at him? Because that would make your dads situation not even remotely Sherman’s fault…which it already is anyway.”

She folded her arms in defiance at him.

He sputtered, unable to come up with a response. “Be-because…”

Suddenly he growled and lunged at me, throwing a few punches. I tried avoiding them but a couple hit their mark and I staggered backwards toward the table and fell onto the bench.

“Hey! Stop it!” Penny tried grabbing his arm but he wrenched it out of her grip and continued toward me.

“Dylan, stop, doing this won’t solve anything.” I said, holding up a hand in defense.

He didn’t listen and pulled back for another punch.

“Stop!” I yelled.

And stop he did. Quite literally.

I gasped. Dylan was frozen in midair, completely still. I looked around, Penny and every single other kid in the lunchroom were completely frozen as well.

_“What the heck is going on…?”_

I tentatively moved out of the way and stood up. As I looked around, I noticed one kid a couple tables over had accidentally knocked their cup over, spilling their drink. But the liquid was suspended in midair, droplets spread out randomly.

It was eerily quiet.

“Hello!?” I yelled. But I received no answer. It felt like I was the only one in the lunchroom. I noticed over the small group of students that had gathered to watch us a couple of the lunchroom monitors were (finally) running over to us, but they were frozen too.

I put a hand to my mouth as I suddenly realized.

_“Am I doing this?? In history, if time were to speed up, that’s what the teachers voice would sound like! I did that… And now… I’ve somehow frozen time.”_

I smiled and let out a whoop.

“I have time powers too!”

Of course, there was no reaction.

After a few more seconds of looking around I suddenly heard a noise. I gasped and whirled around towards the source and noticed one of the droplets from the kids’ spilled drink had hit the floor. Then I noticed the rest of the liquid was slowly following it.

My eyes widened, I looked around and noticed everyone was slowly moving.

Realizing what was about to happen I quickly ran back to my seat and tried to resume my previous position, holding my hand up.

And then suddenly time started moving again, the ambient sounds of the lunchroom, especially the kids drink cup hitting the floor, reached my ears.

But Dylan had stopped mid punch.

“What just happened?” he asked, looking scared.

“I …said stop…” I said.

“No, what did you do? You like…blinked out of existence for a second…”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I lied.

He put his hand down. “I was right, you really are a freak.”

At that moment, the two lunchroom monitors finally came running up.

“Is everything alright here?” one of them asked us.

“Yes, I’m okay… _please_ don’t call my father, I don’t want him to worry.” I said. They nodded.

Dylan scoffed. “Yes, we’re fine…” and walked away.

Penny sighed and sat back down in her seat.

I turned around back to my lunch too, but my mind was reeling. I finally had a chance to process what had had just happened. I stopped time, seemingly out of instinct, and sped up time as well, if I could do that, who knows what else I could do…maybe eventually control it?

I was so lost in thought I didn’t finish eating and Penny noticed.

“Sherman? Are you sure you’re ok?”

Again, I resisted the temptation to tell her anything.

“Yes, I’m fine.” I smiled.

“Good.”

At that moment the bell rang, meaning the end of lunch.

The rest of the day passed by in a blur, but I was too excited to pay attention.

It was finally the end of the day and I practically rushed to the bus stop and didn’t even listen to music the whole trip, I couldn’t wait to tell Mr. Peabody what had happened.

I got off the bus at Peabody Industries and ran inside, giving Ashley a quick greeting and running inside the elevator, rapidly entering the access code and pushing the button for our penthouse floor.

As soon as the doors opened I rushed in.

“Mr. Peabody?? I’m home!” I called out.

“In the living room, Sherman.” Came his voice from said room.

I ran into it and saw him sitting on the couch, reading a book. He put it down and smiled at me.

“Hello Sherman, how was school? I hope you got an A on that report.”

“Oh yeah, I did, and school was ok, but guess what happened??” I said excitedly.

“I can’t possibly guess, the infinite number of variables possible along with the fact we don’t have any kind of telepathic powers linking us contributes to my cluelessness, what happened?” he asked.

I honestly thought he could guess. “What happened to us last night…?” I asked in a sing song voice, helping him out.

His eyes widened. “No… you didn’t…” He got up and hurried over to me. “Did your powers manifest themselves?”

“I think so… I was tired in history, and so I laid my head down, but suddenly the room was buzzing and then suddenly Penny shook me and the class had ended… And then at lunch I was bullied by the son of that guy you let go of last night-”

He gasped. “What?? Why?”

“Well his dad doesn’t have a job anymore because you let him go and now they may apparently lose their house…”

Dad growled, his hackles rising. “It’s absolutely not your fault that his father lost his job…” he said.

After a few seconds he composed himself. “I’ll see if I can do something about that later, what happened at lunch?”

“So, Dylan, that’s his name, came up to me at lunch and was mad at me because you let his dad go. He punched me a couple times, and I told him to stop and… he did.”

“Well that’s good.” Dad said, not getting it.

“Dad… **time** stopped… everyone was frozen, and it was freakishly quiet. I don’t know how I did it, must’ve been instinctual…”

He looked at me in wonder. “Amazing. Does anyone know? Did you tell anyone?”

“No…I don’t think so” I said.

He sighed. “Ok good… I still don’t know about the WABAC, I’ve been working on it all day and I can fix it, it will just take a couple months…”

“Who cares about the WABAC now?? We have time powers! We could use them to travel to any time we please all by ourselves.” I said, smiling.

“No! Nono, there’s quite a few things wrong with that.” He said, holding up his paws toward me and waving them back and forth. “First, we don’t move in space when we use our powers, so if the place we want to travel to is located halfway across the world, we’d have to travel there first using conventional means, then travel to the time we wanted, or vice versa. Second, we don’t know how the landscape will have changed between the now and when we wanted to go, we could end up halfway inside an underground wall, or 50 feet in the air. Not to mention it is very tiring…as I have found out…”

“Oh. I hadn’t thought of that. And what do you mean as ‘you’ve found out’?” I asked, looking at him with a raised eyebrow. Had he been practicing his time powers?

At this point dad held up a paw. “While you were at school I’ve… been practicing using my powers… would you like to see a more interesting demonstration?”

“Well heck yeah!”

“No swearing Sherman,” He scolded. “follow me.” And he led me over to a plant that we had on a table nearby.

“What are we doing? Why are we looking at this plant?” I asked, confused.

“Watch.” Dad said.

He suddenly concentrated his gaze on the plant and reached out with a paw. Then he began to slowly move it to the right. As he did, the plant suddenly began to grow discolored and wilted and eventually it, along with the vase it was in just disappeared.

Suddenly Dad gasped and put his paw down, holding his chest.

“Are you ok??” I asked, steadying him.

“Yes, I’m ok Sherman. Like I said, it’s very tiring if done too much. But as you can see the plant is now gone.” He said, gesturing to the table. “I simply envisioned a sphere around it and then controlled the time with my paw, moving it forward.”

“How far forward?” I asked.

“Over 100 years at least I’m guessing.”

“…and by doing so you decayed it to nothing” I said, finishing for him.

“Yes, precisely. I’ve also determined that the amount of time is inverse to the scope of the change. Meaning that the larger the amount of space we change, the less time we can move in it. Now you reverse it, do it exactly as I did and bring it back. Imagine a sphere encircling it and then make time run backwards.”

“Ok…” I said, unsure of myself.

“You can do it Sherman, if what happened at school is any indication.”

I reached out with a hand toward were the plant used to be and imagined a sphere of…well, something, enclosing it and began to move my hand to the left.

Slowly, I noticed the plant began to reappear, the color returning to it, but at the same time a headache quickly started developing, and I started feeling more tired than I already was, like I was holding up a huge boulder, but I kept going, and once the plant was finally back and to its normal color I let go.

“Ow.” I said as held my head in my hands.

“Sherman your nose is bleeding!” Dad gasped.

I wiped a finger under my nose and felt wetness. I looked at it and there was indeed blood on it.

“Weird.” I said.

“As you can see, our ability to control time draws its power from our own bodies.” Dad said.

“What are we going to do? We can’t just go to any old doctor and tell them what’s wrong with us…” I asked.

“Well… it appears we will just have to live with these powers, for now…and I have a feeling we have much to learn about them…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wooooow, this chapter ended up muuuuch longer than I originally envisioned, I practically had to forcefully stop it. Well, like I said in the first chapter, I only had ideas for two more chapters and these are it. I don’t know how to continue this, which is killing me, because I love this idea a lot more than my first completed multi chapter fic, Ransomed Memories, and I don’t think I’ve had as much fun writing fics than I have with this one, as is probably evidenced by the chapter lengths. I barely ever write two or more chapters with >2k words in a row, much less 3.5k. I think I should have a villain, unless I made the villain time itself somehow, which is an interesting concept, then again, when is time ever not the villain? : P But I also really don’t want to make them official superheroes that everyone knows about with time powers or anything like that, I want the fact they have time powers to stay hidden. Also, again, I used a personal experience as inspiration for writing. Before I got my driver’s license, I would take the public bus to and from that same job I was let go from, and listen to music too. I loved being able to just sit back and jam out while watching the world go by and the many different people board and depart the bus. Also, I need to stop rambling. But before I do, I will do something I have not done yet, which is ask for ideas/suggestions. Let me know your ideas, maybe this could be like Drabble Collection, little short stories of them with their time powers, not an epic time battle between good and evil, as much as I wish it could be… Also, college is starting tomorrow for me, so whether I get any ideas or not it’ll be awhile before new chapters come out anyway.


	4. Spatial Relativity

**Peabody’s POV**

On Saturdays, Sherman and I usually take a trip in the WABAC, but given its current condition, I was worried about the effect that would have on Sherman.

While he has been getting good grades in school, I’ve been worried about his mental health. He doesn’t seem as happy as he used to be and has been asking more and more frequently to go on trips in the WABAC. While I am happy that his enthusiasm for history has remained, I also want him to socialize with his friends at school. But all this could also be indicative of him simply entering puberty as well.

But now that he seems to have time powers of some kind, I’m worried about his impulsivity and possible lack of self-control. He could wreak havoc if left to his own devices.

And that is what I hoped to address with him at breakfast.

We were both finishing up a breakfast of Eggs Benedict (made by yours truly, of course) and Sherman was just standing up.

“Sherman, your plate.” I motioned to the plate he had abandoned on the table.

‘Oh, sorry Dad.” He picked it up and, without another word, walked into the kitchen.

“So, what are you planning on doing today?” I asked, following him into the kitchen with my own dish, trying to be nonchalant about it.

“Well since the WABAC’s not working, I was thinking of going over to Penny’s house to study.” Sherman said as he opened the dishwasher and stooped down to place his plate and utensil into it.

I walked up next to him and placed my own plate into the dishwasher as well. “Well, would you prefer helping me fix the WABAC?” I asked, smiling at him.

Sherman folded his arms and looked at me with knitted brows. “Why? You’re the genius.”

I smiled as I shut the dishwasher. “Now Sherman, you are a genius too given your grades, not as much as me of course, but I still value your company.”

“Well still, what can I do?” Sherman asked as we walked back into the dining room and toward the elevator.

“You…” I hesitated for a nanosecond. “can learn.” I sighed internally. Obviously, I was trying to get Sherman to stay home, but he was slipping away.

He faltered for a second and it almost looked like he had decided against it when he finally spoke.

“Sure why not? It’ll be more interesting than what I’m studying anyways.” He sighed, but then looked at me like I was a suspect in a crime.

“Are you just trying to keep me at home so you can keep an eye on me?” he asked as we entered the elevator

It was the truth of course, and as I said, Sherman was smart.

“Yes, Sherman, I am worried about your adolescent tendencies mixed with your newfound powers” I sighed as the elevator opened to the WABAC’s floor.

“I’ll be fine, dad, I handled the lunchroom just fine yesterday, no one suspected a thing.” Sherman said, following me over to my lab.

“Are you sure?” I asked, turning around and looking at him pointedly.

“Welll…” he said, pulling on his fingers and reminding me of when he was younger and did something wrong. “Dylan seemed to think something was weird, but he didn’t question it.”

“Well then let’s just hope that he doesn’t question it further.” I said turning around again and walking over to the table where I had placed the Time Core.

“So, I know how much you dislike homework and studying, your trips in the WABAC have honed your desire for a more hands on approach to academia, and this should stimulate you enough. But if you still would prefer to go to Miss Peterson’s house… I won’t stop you…” I said, looking at him with a small smile.

I do trust him, I’ve trusted him to fly the WABAC for the past 7 years, and I want to give him a chance to not lose my trust in this situation as well.

Sherman was quiet before he answered. Finally, he smiled and spoke. “Thanks Dad, but I really would like to learn more about how the WABAC works.”

I smiled wide. “Excellent! Well, first things first, we must remove the Time Core’s casing.”

And so, Sherman and I set to work fixing the WABAC. He mostly sat and watched me, but occasionally left and walked over to his corner of the lab where I had given him some tools and space where he could build and research his own projects. He had started a project of his own, and while I hadn’t asked him what it was or looked at it yet, he was in the middle of working on it when I realized that I needed a tool that I didn’t have. It was across the room, but I was holding a piece of the Time Core carefully in place and couldn’t let it go.

I called over to him. “Sherman? Could you pass me the coil spanner? I need to hold this piece in place.” I asked, holding the paw that wasn’t holding it together out behind me.

“Sure dad.” He said. I turned back to the Time Core and the next second later, Sherman was standing right next to me, placing the tool in my paw.

“Thank you, Sherman.” But in my haste and concentration to finish attaching the piece of the Time Core I was holding, I didn’t immediately realize that there was no way Sherman could have traversed the length of the room to the toolbox, look for and pick up the correct tool, then walk over to where I was standing in the time it took for me to ask him.

I turned around and looked up at him, curiously, an eyebrow raised. “Sherman… did you…?”

He hadn’t moved, he was still standing where he had handed me the tool. He smirked slightly but asked “Did I what?” anyways.

“Did you use your time power just now??”

He put a hand behind his head. “I guess? I don’t know, I just thought about quickly handing it to you and then walking back. Guess I must have if it was only a second or two for you.”

I rubbed the bridge of my snout. “Sherman this is exactly why I am hesitant to let you go anywhere you don’t have to now. If you cannot control them, and they are controlled by emotions or unrelated thoughts they could wreak havoc-”

I paused, noticing Sherman’s expression souring.

“I know, it’s not your fault, you didn’t ask for them, but please understand my worry.”

“I do dad,” he said emphatically. “It’s just I can’t help it, but just because I don’t know how to control them yet shouldn’t mean I be kept a prisoner in my own home.” He said, his lips and brows creased in a mixture of annoyance.

“I know Sherman, of course I’ll let you go to school on Monday. Just… be careful.”

“I will try.” He said as I turned back to the Time Core.

There was a moment of quiet when suddenly Sherman gasped. “What was that??”

“Be more specific Sherman, what are you referring to?” I asked absently.

But as soon as the words left my mouth I heard the sound Sherman had as well. A knocking sound had come from upstairs.

We both looked at each other in mixed fear and confusion. We were alone in the penthouse. There shouldn’t be anyone upstairs.

We both hurried over to a section of monitors in the lab and I brought up the security system for the penthouse. On the different monitors we could see the camera feeds and heat signatures for the WABAC floor. We could see ourselves in the camera and were the only two spots of orange and red in a sea of blue hues.

I switched the camera feeds to the penthouse above and we both gasped. In the camera we could see what looked like a team of SWAT members running in from the elevator.

“Why is SWAT here?!” Sherman yelled. “How did they get in?!

“I don’t know, Sherman, but clearly they were let in, the elevator shows no signs of damage and the one-way locks on the fire doors haven’t been tripped!” I replied as I frantically typed at the keyboard, initiating the silent intruder alert protocol.

I whipped around to face him. “But more importantly, how did you hear them before I did?”

“I don’t know, I just did!” he said. “What are we going to do Mr. Peabody??”

I turned around, surveying the situation. One of the SWAT members was holding the elevator open, so that exit was not available, if we tried running down the fire escape stairs, the fire alarm would activate, notifying them of our presence, and the WABAC was out of commission. I turned around slowly to face Sherman again.

“There is only one possibility…we have to try using our time powers.”


End file.
